ELEVEN

[Note from Dave: Please welcome a new guest writer for this site - Bob Pentland. Bob has agreed to write a regular (more
or less) feature here on Dave Sez where he discusses the finer points of football, points the average viewer and announcer
miss. Bob is a great writer and is as comfortable discussing Shakespeare as he is the 3-4. For our purposes here though,
we'll probably stick to gridiron talk.

In Bob's first piece below, he introduces himself and his feature. He also asks for some specific questions to get things
rolling. Feel free to ask anything, no matter how arcane it seems. Want to know how to properly defend a power-I
formation out of a base 4-3? Curious about the difference between a nickel and dime package and when to use either?
Don't understand the difference between a counter and a trap? Just ask in the comments section. Bob will hook you up.

By the way, I'm pretty giddy about this. Bob knows his football and I'm excited to learn and share that with ya'll.]

--------------------------------
This is the first in what will hopefully be a weekly feature. I say hopefully as it's
highly likely that two of the following will happen in the up-coming football
seasons: a) I will forget during the week, leaving it to be done during the
weekend, only to get blasted watching games with friends both Saturday and
Sunday, thus forgetting yet again, or b) Dave will be barraged with hate mail
wondering why he let such irreputable trash sully his fantastic site. Either way,
this is my virgin effort, so I humbly beg your patience and ask you to save your
salvos for when I really stink things up.
As I'm an engineer by trade, and have little of what could be called 'writing
ability' paired with even less creativity, I'm gonna do a little question and answer
session to get this thing rolling. If it gets a little vain, I'm sorry, but I promise -
It's only X's and O's for the rest of the year:

So what is Eleven? Dave has asked me tend lend some knowledge of the finer
aspects of my favorite sport, football. It's called Eleven as it's the greatest number
ever worn (by me, of course), and refers to that aspect of the game which I love
the most - every single play, offensive and defensive, requires eleven men to do
their job if it is to succeed.

What's the format? Uhmmm, evolving? Does that count? That fact is, I'm not
sure yet. I might spend one week talking defensive fronts, the next I might cover a
single play from both sides of the ball. I might breakdown one of the 'hot topic'
schemes that the talking heads are babbling about. I hate to say it, but there's a
good chance that there will be one or two bits in which I get a little philosophical
about the game and what it means to me. And yes, there will always be talk about
my UW Cowboys, the mid-major everyone should love.

Why you? Like many former QB's, I am the son of a high school football coach.
From as early as I can remember, my Augusts through Novembers were spent
lining practice fields, handing out second-rate gear, and collating playbooks. By
the time I was twelve, I knew the ins and outs of my father's offense better than
his starting eleven. My weekends were simple - Friday night watch Dad, Saturday
go to a college game, Sunday break down film from Friday and then watch NFL.
My father was a fantastic QB coach, producing a string of kids who went on to
play college and has one protégé in the NFL and another poised to make the leap
after this year. My own high school career, while successful on an individual level
and full of undeserved accolades, did not suffice to garner any real interest from
DI schools. This wasn't all that surprising or disappointing (Few Wyoming kids
get any looks at all). I did get asked to walk on UW, but decided I'd rather focus
on my education and go the small school route. It's a decision I've never
regretted. I got to see the field from the second quarter of my very first college
game, all the way through to the tear soaked mud of my last game as a senior. I
started my career as a QB, got pt in every game as a freshman, and then was
splitting halves with another kid my sophomore year. After our fourth game of
that year, our secondary had lost its third starter to a season ending injury. That
evening, the HC asked me if I'd be willing to play some FS. As the choice was keep
sharing time at QB, or play every snap at FS, I said yes in a heartbeat. I was tired
of getting blindsided and wanted to dish out some fury of my own. It was a
revelation, and as a college athlete I was reborn. From my QB experience, I could
see plays develop at the snap, and was blessed with a massive chip on my
shoulder from suffering so many rough tackles. In week eight of that year, the QB
I formerly split time with snapped his collarbone midway through the second
quarter, which left me playing both QB and FS. Now, that's not a big deal, as a lot
of kids play both ways through high school, but take my word on this - you don't
want to do it in college. I had to do it for two and a half games, during which I
suffered a career's worth of cheap-shots, a rib cage that was black and blue on
both sides, and a wonderful episode of hypothermia. Fortunately, that was the
last time I had to do that, and stuck on the defensive side of the ball for the rest of
my career. My junior and senior years, I was honored by my teammates and
selected as a defensive captain, and had the added onus of calling all of our
coverages at the LOS. My experience at QB was a tremendous asset, and made me
look much better than I really was. As football was fall, and fall was football, once
my eligibility was up it was a given that I was going to stay for grad school and
help coach for a couple of years. I coached both running backs and wide outs in
season, and worked with the DB's in the off season. Unfortunately, I was not a big
fan of our offensive system or the madness (there was little to no method) behind
it, so spent a good portion of both seasons frustrated. That frustration led to me
saying good bye to my coaching career (kinda - I still work a camp or two) and
reverting to full-time armchair quarterbacking. For the first time since then, at
least outside of arguing at the bar and ruling on playstation, I'm hoping to use
some of that knowledge.

One disclaimer I insist of giving, one law that must be laid down - Football
terminology is different wherever you go, so don't get your panties in a twist if I
call something different than the way they do on TV.

So that's that for this one. If you have comments, suggestions, or better yet,
scheme-based questions, please give them.

-- Bob Pentland

Eleven Archives

DAVE SEZ
ACC sports and more
Email me
« Fantasy Football League? | Main | Opening Weekend »

September 02, 2005

ELEVEN - 2 - THE ZONE BLITZ

Bob Pentland is back for his first lengthy football piece, where he discusses the
trendy zone blitz. As expected, Bob is dropping some serious knowledge here.
Your assignment is to read this and see if you can't spot the real thing this
weekend as the college season kicks off. Maybe you can impress your buddies
with some insider knowledge!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Eleven

It happens so often in blitzing situations anymore that we don't even flinch when
a 300 pound defensive lineman drops into pass coverage. It often seems silly to
take a guy who normally on passing downs has underwear stained dreams of
unprotected QB spines, only to flip things and make him do something he has
practiced only a handful of times. How has the game evolved to a point that the
sharpest defensive minds will try to execute something that seems so askew to
traditional thought? In the following morass, I'm going to try and explain exactly
what a zone blitz is, and why teams are so willing to use the concept.

My knowledge of football history is not as strong as others, so I won't claim to

know who did what first and when. I do, however, have a good working
understanding of hot routes, how and why teams use them, and how the zone
blitz is a natural evolutionary concept to counter offensive pre-snap reads.

To make this whole thing easier I'm going to create a standard situation in which
to expect a passing situation. Let's say it's third and six on the +45 and the ball is
on the left hash. Normal time to expect either a pass or something else based off
of a pass look (screen/draw). For simplicities sake we'll use the following
formation and routes, which are both packages that every college team in the
country runs and I will probably use frequently for examples:
This is a standard cover three beater, as it tries to high low the free safety, and
simple crossing routes are used to try and widen out the LB's to create a passing
seam to the dig route (X) or post (Z). It's also an effective play against a cover 1 as
the dig is one of the toughest covers 1 on 1. Depending on protection schemes, the
TB's responsibility will change, for this example, we will assume he flares to the
right (more field, and more likely a Sam LB if we are expecting cover three).
We're assuming from the start by our play selection that the defense is running a
cover three, so that's what kind of look we'll use for this example. Basically, the
offensive coordinator has reason to expect the D to run a cover three in this
situation. We'll also assume a standard 4-3 to keep it simple:

OK, as I said in the last segment, terminology changes wherever you go, so I'll
give a quick run-down of the one I'm using today:
E - Quick-side/weak-side end
N - Nose guard. Normally plays a shade on the center or even head up
3 - 3 technique. Key guy in stopping the run as he's double-teamed a ton
B - Bull end, just another name for strong side end
W - Will/weak-side LB
M - Mike/middle LB
S - Sam/strong-side LB
DB's are same as always, Corners and then strong and free safeties

As this discussion is about zone blitzes, I should explain a bit about them before
we get too far. Defense is all about numbers. You want things to be balanced on
both sides of the ball for run protection, and you always want to have enough
guys around to cover all of the eligible receivers. Used to be, if an offense was
getting killed by the blitz they'd just keep as many guys in for protection as
possible, and count on their receivers ability to beat the defenses DB's.
Fortunately, someone realized that if a defender was blitzing, then we know for a
fact that there is going to be a hole in the spot he vacated. So they started
coaching QB's and WR's that when they see an LB blitzing, instead of running the
route planned, make a sight adjust and run to the empty spot. So rather than
keeping extra guys in for protection, the new thought was to spread the D out as
far as possible, and then if they tried to blitz with someone and you could
recognize it, you could exploit that open spot in a defense with the nearest
receiver. I'll never forget the first time we got this to work in high school and I hit
our running back on a quick release as two LB's ran by him on the blitz. Ten yard
pass that went for sixty and six on the board; yes I got laid later that night, and
no, it didn't feel as good as that play.

As I said earlier, defense is all about numbers. Therefore, conventional wisdom

dictated that it was very dangerous to run a zone behind a 6 man pass rush. It
would leave you with five men covering five potential receivers in a lot of open
shared space. It was considered better to run cover zero, where your remaining
defenders would all be manned up on a receiver. If you have the athletes, you can
roll the dice like this, but if the pass rush doesn't get to the QB, you're asking for
trouble. At some point, some brilliant DC realized that the threat of a DL's rush
could occupy an OL, and still allow a rushing LB the space needed to get serious
pressure. After the development of the hot route, another DQ realized that if you
could trick a QB into reading the blitz in one area, even though that LB does
come, you could drop a DL into that same vacated area, hopefully taking away
that option, while still getting pressure on the QB. It then became possible to still
run zone coverage behind a pass rush involving two athletic and fast LB's. I'll
draw a scenario up below:

This is still a 4-3 with a cover 3 look, but it obviously looks as if the W and M are
coming. We also see that the FS is walked up and covering up our H a bit, but we
know that if we get the ball to the H immediately, we should have 5 yards, with
the possibility of more. In a perfect world, the H will recognize the blitz and
realize that instead of running the short drag the play calls for, he should look for
the ball quickly and expect it in the spot vacated by the W and M. If you look at
the way the DB's are aligned, it's easy to imagine a cover zero - C on X, FS on H, S
on the TB, SS on Y, and the other corner on Z. This is well and good, if you can
get to the QB quickly. But there is a lot of space out there, and a decent WR
should always be able to get a bit of space quickly, against even good man
coverage. But what if we just drop the E into the spot we expect that H to look for
the hot route? At the snap it will look like the same as above, but imagine a cover
3 behind it and see how it changes right after the snap (I'll leave the original
position in parentheses):
Looks a little confusing, but with some imagination, you can imagine how it will
look real-time. Responsibilities being:

E - hook to flats - meaning he drops looking for an immediate threat behind him
(H on a hot route) and then looks for a man moving towards the flats (outside of
the T to the sideline)
N - rushing lane
3 - rushing lane
B - rushing lane
W - rush/outside contain (no one out of the back field gets wider than him)
M - rushing lane
S - middle of the formation pass drop
SS - hook to flats on the strong side
C's - outside thirds
FS - deep middle third

The trick is to convince the QB and WR's that both W and M are coming, which
shouldn't be hard as they ARE coming. It's also important the that the DL doesn't
tip things off by being in a different stance, or lined up further from the LOS than
normal. Then you should be able to expect the O to sight adjust their routes. As
far as pass protection goes, you make it very hard on the left tackle and left guard.
As far as they are concerned, they have to respect the immediate threat. Meaning,
if the D aligns like above, the guard is expecting center help on the Nose and the
right guard to pick up the Mike so he can take care of the End and the Tackle can
get the Will. That's expecting a lot of communication to be executed properly, and
expecting tough blocks out of both the center and right guard (in this situation
you would expect the right tackle to step down and get the three technique while
the tailback should either stay in and block the Bull, or hold him with his swing
route). Even though the end doesn't come, it's likely the o-line will lose a step on
one of the rushers before they react to the end not coming, and everyone from the
left guard right has to switch their responsibilities a man to right. Seeing stuff like
this will make you understand why those in the know feel that offensive line is
one of the toughest positions in all of sports.

It's much like chess or war, feints on feints on feints. Convince the other guy
beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are doing A, so you expect him to do B, all
the while really running C. This is the stuff that I truly love about the sport, and is
why coaches that can read their opponents are tremendously successful.

So that's a real quick and extremely dirty look at the zone blitz. As always, you got
questions, drop 'em and I'll give them my best.

„ Bob Pentland

DAVE SEZ
ACC sports and more
Email me
« Fantasy Football League? | Main | Opening Weekend »

September 02, 2005

ELEVEN - 2 - THE ZONE BLITZ

Bob Pentland is back for his first lengthy football piece, where he discusses the
trendy zone blitz. As expected, Bob is dropping some serious knowledge here.
Your assignment is to read this and see if you can't spot the real thing this
weekend as the college season kicks off. Maybe you can impress your buddies
with some insider knowledge!
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Eleven

It happens so often in blitzing situations anymore that we don't even flinch when
a 300 pound defensive lineman drops into pass coverage. It often seems silly to
take a guy who normally on passing downs has underwear stained dreams of
unprotected QB spines, only to flip things and make him do something he has
practiced only a handful of times. How has the game evolved to a point that the
sharpest defensive minds will try to execute something that seems so askew to
traditional thought? In the following morass, I'm going to try and explain exactly
what a zone blitz is, and why teams are so willing to use the concept.

My knowledge of football history is not as strong as others, so I won't claim to

know who did what first and when. I do, however, have a good working
understanding of hot routes, how and why teams use them, and how the zone
blitz is a natural evolutionary concept to counter offensive pre-snap reads.

To make this whole thing easier I'm going to create a standard situation in which
to expect a passing situation. Let's say it's third and six on the +45 and the ball is
on the left hash. Normal time to expect either a pass or something else based off
of a pass look (screen/draw). For simplicities sake we'll use the following
formation and routes, which are both packages that every college team in the
country runs and I will probably use frequently for examples:
This is a standard cover three beater, as it tries to high low the free safety, and
simple crossing routes are used to try and widen out the LB's to create a passing
seam to the dig route (X) or post (Z). It's also an effective play against a cover 1 as
the dig is one of the toughest covers 1 on 1. Depending on protection schemes, the
TB's responsibility will change, for this example, we will assume he flares to the
right (more field, and more likely a Sam LB if we are expecting cover three).
We're assuming from the start by our play selection that the defense is running a
cover three, so that's what kind of look we'll use for this example. Basically, the
offensive coordinator has reason to expect the D to run a cover three in this
situation. We'll also assume a standard 4-3 to keep it simple:

OK, as I said in the last segment, terminology changes wherever you go, so I'll
give a quick run-down of the one I'm using today:

E - Quick-side/weak-side end
N - Nose guard. Normally plays a shade on the center or even head up
3 - 3 technique. Key guy in stopping the run as he's double-teamed a ton
B - Bull end, just another name for strong side end
W - Will/weak-side LB
M - Mike/middle LB
S - Sam/strong-side LB
DB's are same as always, Corners and then strong and free safeties
As this discussion is about zone blitzes, I should explain a bit about them before
we get too far. Defense is all about numbers. You want things to be balanced on
both sides of the ball for run protection, and you always want to have enough
guys around to cover all of the eligible receivers. Used to be, if an offense was
getting killed by the blitz they'd just keep as many guys in for protection as
possible, and count on their receivers ability to beat the defenses DB's.
Fortunately, someone realized that if a defender was blitzing, then we know for a
fact that there is going to be a hole in the spot he vacated. So they started
coaching QB's and WR's that when they see an LB blitzing, instead of running the
route planned, make a sight adjust and run to the empty spot. So rather than
keeping extra guys in for protection, the new thought was to spread the D out as
far as possible, and then if they tried to blitz with someone and you could
recognize it, you could exploit that open spot in a defense with the nearest
receiver. I'll never forget the first time we got this to work in high school and I hit
our running back on a quick release as two LB's ran by him on the blitz. Ten yard
pass that went for sixty and six on the board; yes I got laid later that night, and
no, it didn't feel as good as that play.

As I said earlier, defense is all about numbers. Therefore, conventional wisdom

dictated that it was very dangerous to run a zone behind a 6 man pass rush. It
would leave you with five men covering five potential receivers in a lot of open
shared space. It was considered better to run cover zero, where your remaining
defenders would all be manned up on a receiver. If you have the athletes, you can
roll the dice like this, but if the pass rush doesn't get to the QB, you're asking for
trouble. At some point, some brilliant DC realized that the threat of a DL's rush
could occupy an OL, and still allow a rushing LB the space needed to get serious
pressure. After the development of the hot route, another DQ realized that if you
could trick a QB into reading the blitz in one area, even though that LB does
come, you could drop a DL into that same vacated area, hopefully taking away
that option, while still getting pressure on the QB. It then became possible to still
run zone coverage behind a pass rush involving two athletic and fast LB's. I'll
draw a scenario up below:
This is still a 4-3 with a cover 3 look, but it obviously looks as if the W and M are
coming. We also see that the FS is walked up and covering up our H a bit, but we
know that if we get the ball to the H immediately, we should have 5 yards, with
the possibility of more. In a perfect world, the H will recognize the blitz and
realize that instead of running the short drag the play calls for, he should look for
the ball quickly and expect it in the spot vacated by the W and M. If you look at
the way the DB's are aligned, it's easy to imagine a cover zero - C on X, FS on H, S
on the TB, SS on Y, and the other corner on Z. This is well and good, if you can
get to the QB quickly. But there is a lot of space out there, and a decent WR
should always be able to get a bit of space quickly, against even good man
coverage. But what if we just drop the E into the spot we expect that H to look for
the hot route? At the snap it will look like the same as above, but imagine a cover
3 behind it and see how it changes right after the snap (I'll leave the original
position in parentheses):
Looks a little confusing, but with some imagination, you can imagine how it will
look real-time. Responsibilities being:

E - hook to flats - meaning he drops looking for an immediate threat behind him
(H on a hot route) and then looks for a man moving towards the flats (outside of
the T to the sideline)
N - rushing lane
3 - rushing lane
B - rushing lane
W - rush/outside contain (no one out of the back field gets wider than him)
M - rushing lane
S - middle of the formation pass drop
SS - hook to flats on the strong side
C's - outside thirds
FS - deep middle third

The trick is to convince the QB and WR's that both W and M are coming, which
shouldn't be hard as they ARE coming. It's also important the that the DL doesn't
tip things off by being in a different stance, or lined up further from the LOS than
normal. Then you should be able to expect the O to sight adjust their routes. As
far as pass protection goes, you make it very hard on the left tackle and left guard.
As far as they are concerned, they have to respect the immediate threat. Meaning,
if the D aligns like above, the guard is expecting center help on the Nose and the
right guard to pick up the Mike so he can take care of the End and the Tackle can
get the Will. That's expecting a lot of communication to be executed properly, and
expecting tough blocks out of both the center and right guard (in this situation
you would expect the right tackle to step down and get the three technique while
the tailback should either stay in and block the Bull, or hold him with his swing
route). Even though the end doesn't come, it's likely the o-line will lose a step on
one of the rushers before they react to the end not coming, and everyone from the
left guard right has to switch their responsibilities a man to right. Seeing stuff like
this will make you understand why those in the know feel that offensive line is
one of the toughest positions in all of sports.
It's much like chess or war, feints on feints on feints. Convince the other guy
beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are doing A, so you expect him to do B, all
the while really running C. This is the stuff that I truly love about the sport, and is
why coaches that can read their opponents are tremendously successful.

So that's a real quick and extremely dirty look at the zone blitz. As always, you got
questions, drop 'em and I'll give them my best.

„ Bob Pentland

ELEVEN - 3 - THE COVER TWO

This week's edition of Eleven concerns the Cover Two, a base defense that was
mentioned in last week's zone blitz article. Once again, Bob has a lot of great
information for you, so read slowly (something that should come easily for you
Virginia Tech fans... I keed, I keed!)

By the way, if you have any suggestions for future articles, leave a comment. Bob
knows all.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Eleven

Last week, we talked a bit about the zone blitz, and as an example I used a
collection of routes that I called a cover three beater. Well, that's well and good,
but why would you call it a cover three beater? Would the zone blitz not work as
well against a cover two? What about cover four? Really, what's the difference
between cover two and cover four? What? Why? ? ? ?

OK, I hope you get the point. Lots of questions to be asked about different
coverages. Due to the difficulty in drawing this stuff in Word, and in fitting it into
a manageable space, I'm going to focus on only one - Cover two. Now, I hope
everyone knows what a cover two is, but to make sure, I'll draw it up and explain
it below. For diversity's sake, I'll use a different formation from last week. For
simplicity's sake as well, we'll forget about field position, assume the ball is in the
middle of the field, and assume a vanilla front (no twists, slants, blitzes - just a
straight up 4-3 cover two).

Basic Rundown:
E: Run responsibility - outside contain, Pass - outside contain of QB
N: Run - weak A gap (between G and C), Pass - collapse the pocket
3: Run - strong B, Pass - collapse the pocket
B: Run - C gap (T and Y), Pass - contain
W: Run - weak B, Pass - Hook to curl
M: Run - Strong A, Pass - hole
S: Run - Contain, Pass - hook to curl
C: Run - strong outside force (i.e. force any outside run play to have to turn back
up field. Anyone gets outside of you - you die), Pass - Flats, support deep
FS/SS: Run - support late, Pass - deep outside halves

OK, 3 things about alignment -

1) Which safety is where is kind of a toss-up against this formation. Your SS is

normally stronger against the run, while the FS is normally a better coverage guy,
but the pass strength and run strength are the same in this formation. When I
played, I preferred to align as above for two reasons: A) With only one real threat
for the weak side corner (X), he can give a lot of support in coverage to the SS and
he can play the run a little tougher, and B) you will see a lot of LB flow to the
strong side, often leaving you vulnerable to the cutback - therefore it's nice to
have a SS filling that cutback lane to rattle some teeth.
2) As we talked about zone blitzes and sight adjusted routes last week, if S doesn't
widen (he stays inside or right on top of the Y) the H is gonna catch a lot of balls.
Therefore he needs to adjust his alignment to take away the immediate throw to
the H. Furthermore, since he has quite a few immediate threats to his zone (Y, H
and Z) it makes more sense to get to where he can cover any of the three when
they come to his area. Really though, you shouldn't have to tell him to get there
more than once, because if he doesn't on the first outside run play he's gonna get
crack-backed so hard by the H that his mom will shit her pants. Both M and W
should bump a little to balance the formation.

3) Notice the alignment of the corners. They should always be outside of the
WR's, and should never let them get a clean release outside of them. A lot of
coaches even have them play at a tilt with their ass to the sideline. I'll explain why
later.

OK, OK, we got that cleared up, and hopefully understand where everyone should
be aligned, and roughly what their responsibility is. So the question now is, why?
Why run a cover two?

First things first - if you have corners that can play, it can be very tough against
the run. For teams that like to try and get the ball to the edge on a toss or stretch,
a good run-support corner in two can wreak havoc. If he plays it right, it
essentially eliminates the edge, as he should always make the ball carrier turn up
field, or right back into the pursuit. Also, when the corners take away the edge, it
constricts the amount of space that the DL and LBs are responsible for, making
things much easier for them. When you condense that space, it makes it much
harder for the offensive line to generate seams for the ball carrier to slip through.
Having the corners wide does take away some support from the safeties, but you
still have quite a few men in the box.

Secondly - a well run cover two is very strong against a short- to mid-range
passing attack. You have five men, all responsible for underneath coverage, and
since the LBs don't have to try and get to the flats, they don't have to turn and run
nearly as much as they will in a cover 3 or any man. Since they don't have to run
as much horizontally, it's more likely they will get good depth on their pass drops
and help clog up some of the mid-range passing lanes. It gives them a good
chance to sit on crossing routes and light up anybody who tries to come across
the middle. Another benefit - if you have safeties who can run, it should make you
less vulnerable to the BIG passing play; they only have one responsibility in the
passing game - don't let anyone deeper than you.
So then, how do you beat a cover two?

As I said earlier, the corner can never let the WR in front of him get an outside
release. Here's why:

OK, the corner on the left has done his job and forced X to an inside release,
making it easy for the SS to get on top. The corner on the right though let his guy
get outside of him, which makes FS have to cover a lot of ground in getting on top
of both H and Z. A good QB, when he reads two, will be looking to get the ball to
Z in what's called the void. The void is the no-man's land just behind the corner
along the sideline (about twelve to twenty yards down field). Too deep and the FS
can get there, too shallow and the corner might still be able to break on the ball
and make a play. Also, as soon as that Z gets behind the corner, he has no idea
where Z is, as his eyes should be towards the field. Therefore he needs to learn
from his buddy on the other side and keep Z in front of him so he can see him
along with the rest of his threats. Let's assume he DID his job this time:
Makes a huge difference. Can Z still get to the void? Yes, but that's as difficult of a
timing throw as there is, even on a clean release. By doing what he did, he forced
that receiver to change his timing, and he also squeezed down the spot that the
QB can throw to. OK, now that we got people doing their jobs, let's talk
responsibilities:

Left Corner: Pre-Snap threats - X, T. Assignment - force X into an inside release,

if X sits in zone, stay on him, if he runs, stay on his hip, but get eyes on number 2
(T), if 2 shows (which he does in this case), release X to SS (Talking to him as you
do), and rally up to the tailback.

SS: Pre-Snap threats - X, Y, T. Assignment - Need to be wide enough to stay on

top of X, but not so wide that you can't help the FS down the middle of the field.
Get depth and then break on the ball when it's thrown.

FS: Pre-Snap threats - Z, Y, and H are all immediate threats, so the FS needs to
be in a position to get on top of all three. This does NOT mean right in the middle
of all three. It takes the ball a lot longer to get to Z down the sideline then it does
to get to Y right down the seam, so play accordingly. Since he has three threats, at
the snap he should get immediate depth, keep his eyes on the QB, all while
talking with his SS and C. Must be very vocal to not only help himself, but to
allow his underneath coverage to help him.

Right Corner: Pre-Snap threats - Z, H, Y. Assignment - force Z into an inside

release, if he sits you sit, if he runs you keep on his outside hip but eyes go
immediately to number 2 (H). If 2 breaks outside, asshole him or take the pick for
six, if 2 disappears (meaning he goes deep or crosses the formation), eyes go right
to three (Y), where the same rules apply. If all three disappear, keep sinking to
help the FS on anything in the void.

W: Pre-Snap threats - X, Y, T. Assignment - get into a zone drop and get some
width to get in the passing lane if X tries come inside. Look for the crossing route
from Y, or a hook from the tailback.

M: Pre-Snap threats - Y, H, T. Assignment - Get a little depth, look to cause a

collision with any crossing routes. The longer the QB holds the ball, the deeper
you should sink.

S: Pre-Snap threats - H, Y, Z, T, Assignment - Look to clog passing lanes to both

H and Z, and if Y shows in his face, collision him.

When I say collision, I mean collision. LBs should never let a man get across their
face or the formation without any contact. Not only does it create confusion, but
it changes timing and doesn't let the routes get as deep. This is very important.
The corners can also adjust the way they play. What if the WRs for the opposing
team are pretty speedy? Maybe get right up in their face so they don't get a clean
release, or maybe sit back a bit and try and bait the QB to throw a quick one
(think Deion before people wised up), but what ever you do, don't let him get
outside of you. If he tries to go outside, you push him all the way out of bounds.

Clear as water? Clear as mud? Sorry, it's tough to describe this stuff without being
on the field. When I prioritize threats above, that's just what each player should
do before the snap, in his head. In all reality, defenses don't really care what
positions are called. They care about eligible receivers, and that's about it. You do
have to communicate though, so I'll explain the systems I grew up in, which
should clarify what I mean by 1, 2, and 3. We always counted from the outside in,
so the formation above would look like this in defensive jargon (minus the big
boys, no offense meant):
For the left corner his number 2 is T, but the tailback is not really an immediate
threat. That's why he should give the SS solid support on the X. For the SS, his
number 2 will be the Y, but like for the corner, Y isn't an immediate threat. On
the flip side, the FS really needs to be chatting up his corner about numbers 2 and
3, especially if 1 is going deep. The corner should really stay on 1 until either 2 or
3 show in the flats.

So that's roughly how a cover two works. Now the question is how do we beat it?
As always in football, there are a number of ways, but they aren't guaranteed. It's
all about putting your guys in a position where they can make a play, and if a
defender screws up, they can make a big play. I already demonstrated one route
package that makes it very tough on the FS. But in the following I'll show a couple
of different things. One thing you will often hear people talk about is combination
routes. Combos can be effective against any coverage, but I'll just show a couple
that can cause problems for a cover two. Combo routes can be any number of
receivers, but to keep things simple I'm just going to use 2 v 2:
1 runs a short stop route to hold the corner while 2 runs a corner route over the
top. This combo will often include a number 3 receiver attacking the middle of
the field to hold the FS. A good free should always be able to get there, but it can
be a long run at times. A good corner should be ready to sag and break on the ball
as well.

2 runs off the FS while 1 runs a square in. Yes, you should have LBs to clog the
passing lane to 1, but since 2 disappeared, the corner has to stay with 1 unless
another receiver shows in the flat. Very tough cover. If you watched the South
Carolina - Central Florida game the other day, you may have seen this particular
combo as Spurrier runs it a bunch. They actually missed a big play when the FS
got confused and let 2 run right by him.

The 1 blocks the corner while the 2 takes one step and then gets a quick pass. It's
plays like this that require the LB on that side to widen out. A good variation to
run off of this, if you've completed the quick screen once or twice is to have the 1
block for a second, and then run up the sideline. Hopefully the FS will be rallying
up to help on the screen, while the corner is trying to fight off the pseudo block.

Those are just a few combo routes that I remember disliking in my DB cover two
days. The trick in beating any zone (in any sport, really) is to stretch it and then
create seams. With a cover two, you try to stretch the safeties horizontally. With a
cover three you try to stretch it vertically and attack underneath. Route running is
very important in doing any of this. OCs send receivers to certain spots for a
reason, namely to occupy certain defenders. A good receiver should also be able
to recognize a hole in a zone and know when to sit in one and when to keep
stretching, but that's something that takes a long time to learn. Some people,
including coaches, never learn it. One staff I worked on coached the WRs to
always sit in holes and never had people that kept running. They could never
understand why we weren't able to open things up like they expected. But that's a
story for another time. Check back with ya next week.

-- Bob Pentland

ELEVEN - 4 - ZONE BLOCKING

The fourth chapter in Bobby P's playbook concerns zone blocking. You hear the
term on the weekends and you nod your head, but you have no idea what they're
talking about. In fairness, the talking heads probably don't know either. Read this
and you will know.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Eleven

Is there anything more beautiful than seeing an offensive line move in concert,
washing a defensive front to one side, and then out of the mass of confusion,
seeing a running back cut back against the grain through a massive hole that
seems to appear out of nowhere? Most football purists would agree with you.
Well if you ask me, I'd have to say seeing a wily free safety fill that cutback lane
with some serious authority is a much prettier sight, but I am a little biased.
The running game in football used to be pretty simple. The most complex things
you would see for line play were some pulling guards to run sweeps or traps. But
then several years ago you began to hear the word zone get thrown around more
and more frequently until it's about all you hear anymore. Now, I don't know all
the ins and outs of how a zone should be blocked, so I won't pretend to be an
expert, but I will try to go through the basics to simplify things a bit. In the
offense you and I grew up in, most of the time the running back had a specific
point to try to run through, and the OL tried to create a seam right in that spot.
With zone, you don't tell the running back exactly where to go. You direct his first
couple of steps, and the point at which he gets the hand-off from the QB, but
from there it's his responsibility to find a seam.

There are a couple different kinds of zone, two of the most common being the
inside zone and the zone stretch. The inside zone is more of a downhill attack,
and is more likely to produce the cutback lane. The zone stretch does just what it
sounds like - runs more towards the edge, trying to get defensive flow
horizontally so a vertical seam can be created for the back to dart through.

Blocking the zone is where it really helps to have linemen who can move
horizontally. In fact, the OL must be able to move horizontally, all while keeping
their shoulders square to the LOS (line of scrimmage) and while engaging the
defense. If they open up their shoulders at all, at can create a seam for the
defense to get penetration and disrupt the play before it starts. Their first step
(the coaches I worked with called it a bucket step) is incredibly important. In
most instances it's going to be a very short (6 inches), very quick step directly to
the side in which the play is running (in a zone to the right it will to the right with
the right foot and vise versa). It should be almost directly horizontal. The reason
the first step is so important is it allows them to keep a solid base, and ensures
they stay squared to the line.

To start off we'll talk about the inside zone to the strong side against a basic 4-3
front out of an I set with one TE:
In a traditional iso play, everyone would block the man in front of them while the
fullback picked up the Mike and the TB followed him through the hole. This
works fine, but if the defense runs any twists or slants, it can really affect the
results of the play. That's the primary reason for running a zone type scheme;
instead of being responsible for an individual, you have to work with the guy next
to you to block whoever shows. I'll draw it below, blown up a little more than
usual to make it a little bit easier:

As you can see, I've drawn them blocking in pairs, with a bold line denoting the
first responsibility and the dotted line denoting second level responsibility. There
is only one dotted line for each second level player because the two blockers have
to work together and pick him up depending on which side he shows. You can see
why the first step would be very important for them. If the Center takes too big of
a step, he'll leave a large gap allowing the Nose to crash down on him, disrupting
the entire play. If he takes too little of a step, he can't induce any flow (LBs read
the OL's steps and will slide the same direction to maintain their position) from
the Mike making it much more difficult for him and the guard to pick him up.
Looking at this, is it clear why guys who are good in the 3 technique are so
valuable to a defense? He's going to be facing an immediate double team on
almost any running play, and if he can force his hand on those offensive linemen,
his LBs are going to LOVE him as they will make a TFL (tackle for loss) after TFL.
It's also very clear to see why and where that cutback lane is going to be (right off
the left hip of the left guard). It's very important that the left guard and center
don't lose any ground to the nose - if he gets any penetration whatsoever, the
potential cutback lane disappears. You should also be able to visualize why you
don't need to cutback all the time. There should be running space in both the A
and B gaps on the strong side. In fact, we tried to work with our RBs to pound it
on the strong side a couple of times to try and develop quicker defensive flow to
the strong side, thusly making the cutback an even better option later.

For the QB, it's very important that he gets the ball the running back as deep and
as quickly as possible. Again, the quicker and deeper you get the tailback the ball,
the better angle he has at the cutback lane. In my eyes, the best thing to do with
the QB after a play like this where he didn't have to get too lateral to make the
handoff is to boot back to the weak side (fake the handoff and then turn his back
to the LOS and loop back to the opposite side). The boot does two things here
that a straight drop won't do for you: A) helps hold the defensive end from
crashing down, B) keeps the Will LB honest for the same reasons, and C) it gives
you more options offensively for the play action.

What about in a different set though? What if you don't have the FB? Well a lot of
that depends on what formation are you in, and how the defense generally lines
up against that formation. I'll show you one case below:
In this situation, Will should widen out a bit (as explained in a previous article)
pre-snap for pass reasons. Because his position is a bit different, Mike and Sam
have to adjust a bit as well. This does two things to the offense, it makes the block
on Will much more difficult, thus making the cutback a bit of a riskier
proposition (unless you've done your job as an OC and made him nervous about
the boot and passes into the flat, thus making him a little slow on his run fills).
And it also changes the route to the Mike, again making the cutback seam a little
tougher to create. As a benefit though, it should make the defense much softer on
the strong side of the ball. You can clearly see how some times a ball carrier will
take the inside zone and, rather than cutting back, bounce the play outside to the
strong side. These are the kind of things a RB should come to recognize through
repetition in practice.

Now for the stretch zone:

The stretch is obviously much different, and has entirely different aims than the
inside zone. Rather than trying to get flow that you can seal off and cut behind,
you're trying to force the defensive front to flow and to stretch horizontally so you
can create seams. There are options with what you want to do blocking as well. If
you have a speedy tailback, you don't always even have to block the weak side
end, letting the tackle go immediately to the second level. However, if that end is
good, you may want to keep the tackle on him, hoping that congestion will make
it tough for the Will to make a play (it usually does). Again, the bulk of the OL is
going to be working as a team trying to get a body onto the defenders in the
second level. This time, the fullback is working as a lead blocker, hopefully
picking up the first body that shows, and chipping the outside shoulder of the bull
end if he needs to help the Y seal that edge. The tailback is taking a much more
aggressive outside path, forcing the QB to hustle to get him the ball. Again, you
want the hand-off as deep as possible so the tailback has better angles on any
potential lanes. Since the Bull is taught to keep his outside free, he will often
press upfield as much as he can. In this instance, a lot of teams will teach the Y to
let him go that way, but force him WELL outside. That way the FB and TB can cut
underneath him and run right off the block of the RT on Sam. As the QB has to
work so hard to get the TB the ball, it makes much more sense to have the QB
plant his right foot after the hand-off and sink into a pocket behind the original
strong B gap.

Here's how it looks in the other formation:

In this situation, a lot hinges on the ability of both the Bull and your Y. If the Bull
is quick, the Y should try and get him to commit up field and then seal off a lane
for the TB to run through. If he's strong, just try and keep him in the same place
and let the TB bounce the play outside. The H/FB shouldn't worry too much
about getting to Will. He should try, but if Will disappears quickly then he needs
to work to the secondary and hope to get a body on the FS.

It's always very important for the TB to stay patient and let the zone develop, but
it's also necessary that as soon as he sees a crease - accelerate through it. These
types of plays take a lot of repetition in practice to run well, and the reps will help
the TBs understand when and where to expect those creases to open up. The zone
is a fantastic play, but can be greatly disrupted by one or two talented defensive
linemen. Inside penetration kills the play, as does a failure to communicate
among the offensive line.

Well, that's that. Next week I'll talk about the play action look off of the zone, and
explain why the boot is my favorite play of all time.

- Bob Pentland

ELEVEN - 5 - THE BOOTLEG

For Bobby P's fifth Eleven entry, he breaks down his favorite offensive maneuver,
the quarterback bootleg. You're certain to see a bunch of these this weekend, so
read up and impress your friends with talk of progressions and third options.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Eleven

I know it's been a long time, and to be honest, it's all Dave's fault. See, he'd
promised my pick of the ladies, at least one for every piece. I'd decided it was
finally time to cash in, found myself a honey, and said "I pick you, Dave said it
was cool." Well, I guess Dave's abilities aren't as far reaching as he'd like us all to
believe, nor as far reaching as the slap she tossed my way. So I did some thinking
and decided I didn't want to work for 'favors' or anything else. So, much like
Disco Stu, from now on, Bobby P works pro bono.

Did you watch that beautiful dismantling of the defending Super Bowl champions
by the Denver Broncos? Yeah, the Pats came back a bit at the end, but that was all
by design; you do know that Shanahan's a genius, right? But if you did watch, in
the second and third quarters when Denver built that 28-3 lead, you saw them
use the combination of their running game threat and Plummer's mobility and
ability outside the pocket to dismantle the Pats. In my last piece, I explained
the basics of two different zone-blocking plays, and mentioned the bootleg (also
known as the waggle) play action you can run off of one of them. Here and now
we'll diagram and discuss the boot.

To make the connection with the run action clearer, we'll start with one of the
formations that were used last time to show an inside zone. First things first -
play action is only as good as the run fake it starts with. The whole point of play
action is to freeze both the LBs and safeties and hopefully cause them to lose
crucial seconds in establishing their position for pass coverage. The first thing
everyone sees is the ball fake by the QB. We're fortunate now in that we get to
watch one of the best ever at this in action in Peyton Manning. Watch him next
chance you get and see how his first couple of steps and action with his head and
the ball are exactly the same as when he hands the ball off. It's beautiful to watch.

However, that should only work against the defensive linemen, as a good LB
should not be reading the QB, but rather the O-line. Because of this, a lesser
known aspect of good play action involves the O-line. The quickest pass/run
indicator for defensive players is when right at the snap, you see all of the O-
linemen sit back in the chair to pass block. Because of this, many good play action
teams school their O-line to fire out at the snap as if they are run blocking. They
can't, of course, go downfield, but they have a yard or two in which to work. Not
only does this greatly improve the run fake, but it will also keep the D-line's
hands down, making it MUCH easier for the QB if he has to get rid of the ball
quickly (the pass can't get batted down). Now on to the play:
Position instructions:

X: On the run play, he should be working on a direct route at the safety, hoping to
get a downfield block for his TB if he springs the run. For that reason, he should
take the same initial path on the play action, breaking back to the outside at
about the same time as his QB, aiming for a spot about twenty yards downfield
along the sideline. Not a first choice, but a definite big play threat.

Y: He has a couple of choices on his release. If the guy on the end of the line is to
his outside, he should take at least one outside step, and possibly even make a
little contact, but not work all the way to an outside release. If the man is head-up
or a bit inside, then he should try to get an outside release as it will induce LB
flow to the run fake side. After clearing the DL, he needs to try and avoid LB
contact, and run towards a spot ten to twelve yards downfield. A very likely
target.

Z: The backside post. He has to work back towards the middle of the field,
because if he doesn't, the number of QBs who could even get him the ball is one
or two. Ever. It's a long throw and the QB is moving the wrong direction to even
throw it. He's not a real threat initially, but is more of what we would call a booth
read. Meaning, the QB won't usually look there, but the offensive coaches in the
press box will watch and see if the safety in the middle of the field is over-
committing to the play side. If you do get the booth read to go here, this can be a
HUGE play (think Easy Ed McCaffrey and some of the long balls he used to catch
from Elway on the back side of plays).

F: The keystone to the whole deal. On his release, he has to engage the outside
shoulder of the end. If he goes inside of the end or misses him on the outside, he
can give the end a free up-field release and allow him to potentially kill the QB.
Making solid contact with the end will also make him 'disappear' to the LB on his
side (it's a natural reaction by a defender to lose track of a pass threat that goes to
block someone at the LOS). It's also crucial to the timing of the play. If he gets too
far in front of the QB, it makes the throw ten times more difficult, as the angle of
the throw is much more severe. It will also stop him from running out of room at
the sideline. The depth on his route can be anywhere from a yard behind the LOS
to no deeper than 3 or 4 yards downfield. Too deep and he runs into where the
TE's route is going. Spacing is crucial to an effective passing attack.

TB: His job is simple: either get tackled, or punish one of those D-linemen who
have been twisting his ankle in the bottom of piles all game. Getting tackled is
preferred as it will cause a cluster in the middle, and can help hide the ball.

QB: There are three things that are crucial for a QB to understand about the
bootleg. The first is to be patient, but not slow. I know, I know, it sounds a bit like
an oxymoron, but if he bails on the run-fake too quickly, it ruins the effectiveness
of the play. So he needs to be quick to the running back, slow on the fake, and
then quick again when he boots back around. That brings us to the second
important concept; get depth early so you can attack downhill. The rule we
followed was to get to at least seven or eight yards deep from the LOS and then as
you are making the corner, run right at your target. Too many QBs have the
tendency to drift sideways towards the sideline on the boot, making their throws
less accurate and not allowing them to get the same velocity on the ball. The third
part of running the boot effectively as a QB is to ALWAYS read low to high.
Unless it's third and long, where you need to get the ball to a certain spot, you
should never pass up an open receiver to make a more difficult throw. His read
progression should always go 1, 2, 3, and then 4 only if given the green light by a
coach (except for at the top level. They should be able to make that read on the
fly.). As always, he also has the run option, which can also help to freeze the
defense (think when Vick is out of the pocket). If you have a good running QB,
coaches will sometimes even call the play with the run being the first option,
telling the receivers to block for the QB. The run option is also much better if the
QB did his job initially and got depth. To get around the containment of the D, if
the QB is too close to the line of scrimmage, he has to run at an angle much closer
to parallel with the LOS. If he got proper depth initially, the angle he needs to get
around the contain is much less acute, allowing him to pick up more yards
quickly if he decides to run the ball.

This waggle is a great example of a three level route, which is a common theme in
offensive systems as it really simplifies the read progression. It's also a great play
to get creative. You can run it out of all sorts of different formations, and still get
the same result in the end, but you always want to have a target at each of the
following: the LOS, ten yards deep, and twenty yards deep (although you can run
it as a two man route as well).

So let's get creative:

Same formation, different responsibilities-

Doesn't change things too much, but a simple change if the safety has been
jumping the X's route a bit. If you have a TE that can run, you might be able to
sneak him behind and get a big gain. Or you might want to work the X and try to
get him matched up with an LB and try the same thing.

Now let's look at the same formation, but with the run fake to the weak side,
rather than the strong:

This variation can work well against a cover two, as you send two guys at the
corner in the flat, which won't allow him to provide any deep support for the
safety on the Y's corner route. If you froze the safety with a good play fake, or
even better - got him to commit to the run, the Y can be hit for a long gain. I also
like this variation from about the twenty going in. You have the Y going to the
deep corner, the Z working the front pylon, and if you get the ball to the fullback,
you have both the Z and the Y to provide potential downfield blocks.

One more variation, from a two TE, one RB formation with motion from the Z
receiver:
You will see this variation when teams will frequently use motion to help get their
wideouts into the box to help block for the running game. It can be very effective,
as they tend to get lost in the traffic inside, and then, assuming zone coverage,
allow you to work a WR on either a SS or an LB. It it's man, by putting the Z in
motion the Corner either has to follow him which can cause confusion inside, or
bump responsibilities, which also let's you work the LB or SS with a WR.

As you can see, there are millions of options. It's this diversity and the fact that it
allows the QB to get outside and be an athlete, which makes the waggle/boot such
an effective play. In my playing days, it was always my favorite. I loved the
deception aspect of it both with the hidden ball trick and the footwork. I thought
the trick was to get to the RB quick, and then as I carried out the fake, to make
sure I was slow, I would force myself to switch my weight from my back leg to my
front, and to watch the back of the RB for just a second. I loved the thrill of
knowing I'd turned my back on a player who wanted to crush me, and it was up to
my ability to convince him we were running the ball to protect me (we ran a lot of
naked, where we either didn't have the fullback to chip the end, or he went to the
same side as the RB for the play fake on an iso look). I loved finally ripping my
eyes back around, seeing the end crash inside out of the corner of my eye, and
then seeing all that open grass in front of me. I loved the simplicity of the reads,
allowing me to do nothing more complicated than play. I loved hitting my
fullback, and then sprinting downfield, hoping to pick up a block. I loved setting
my feet, coming back against the grain, and waiting for my tight end from the
backside to fill the wide-open second level. I loved it when my backside post
would come up to me on the sideline and tell me we have it, the two of us asking
the coach if we can go to it, getting the green light, and then getting six. I loved it
because no offensive play better exemplifies the fact that it takes all eleven men to
do their job, all the time. The play doesn't work if you can't run the ball. The play
doesn't work if the O-line doesn't sell the run. The play doesn't work if either the
QB or the FB gets in a hurry. The play doesn't work if the QB gets greedy.

But for all that, it's still a simple play and is effective at every level of play. That's
the beauty of football.

- Bob Pentland

editor's note: I'm not sure how Bob struck out while invoking my name. He must
have had a booger on his nose.

ELEVEN - 6 - EXTRA POINTS AND FIELD GOALS

In what should be the final Eleven (this year), the Great Bobby P pulls the curtain
back on one of the most common, but overlooked plays in football - the kick for
points. Nowhere else will you read a technical football article that includes
references to both Shakespeare and Hoosiers! Enjoy.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!"

I open this second-to-last installment with a quote from Richard IIIfor several
reasons. The first of these is that I have been much like the stooped, lustful,
grasping regent over the last several weeks. Dave offered me a simple task, a
periodic column on the X's and O's of football. It seemed simple enough, but I
warned him early on that my schedule is often hectic, so that I had doubts about
my reliability. Well-founded doubts, obviously. I've been about as reliable as
coke-fiend. This was for no malicious intent, although from Dave's angle, that
doesn't really matter. He was hoping for columns that he didn't get. He even
added a well timed prod or two to get me going, which alas, missed their mark.
Sorry Dave. If we do this next season, assuming you would have me back, I
promise a better effort. [Ed: Come on man, its a blog, not the New York Times.
No worries.]

The second reason I selected the quote above is that it seems at times of our
greatest need, the simplest things can be the hardest to come by. There is no
simpler play in football than the field goal/extra point. This simplicity though, is
countered by the fact that every single time the kicking unit is on the field, points
are there to be had. The game is played to score more points than the other team,
so it's only common sense that teams would spend plenty of time on plays in
which you score points, correct?

If only the world was that simple.

Fact is, many, many, many teams at the college level (and sometimes even at the
pro) take these simple plays for granted, which translates to poor technique and
lost points. As you well know, lost points are costly. So herein, I will discuss the
simple extra point, compare different formations, discuss fakes, and what to do
when things go wrong. If this seems overly simple to you, and something of no
consequence, then I say you can never again complain when a kick by your team
is blocked or a snap is fumbled.

We'll start with the basic kicking formation:

Alignment rules:
C: Over the ball (duh)

TE's, T's, and G's: Nothing can get inside you, so you obviously take a tight split.
No more 4" from the outside leg of the guy inside of you. You do want to have a
slightly wider base than normal, but not so wide that you are easily knocked
backwards.

W's: at a 45 degree tilt, with the toes of the inside leg no more than six inches
behind the outside foot of the TE

H: If playing outside on the grass, you let the kicker pick his spot, but make sure
its at least seven yards deep from the line of scrimmage (LOS). I prefer seven and
a half, as the half yard can mean the world when it comes to getting the kick
blocked at the LOS. When you kneel down, the first rule is to keep your knee
facing the LOS on the ground and have your back knee up. This is a point of
contention with some coaches. They feel that if you have the LOS knee up, you
can use it as a stop for your arm when placing the ball for the kick, thus being
able to return it right where the kicker wanted it. These coaches never held. When
the LOS knee is up, all it takes is an over exuberant block attempt by a defender
to blow out your knee and tear the piss out of your groin. Not a good thing. Keep
the front knee down and the back one out of the kicker's way. The toes on the
down leg should be curled underneath you so if you have to spring up to catch a
bad snap, you can do it that much quicker.

K: Wherever he wants to be. But he should take as few steps as possible for the
kick. Getting the ball out as quickly as possible is the key.

Now for the assignments:

The snap - This is the most widely screwed up aspect of the play, and it should be
the simplest. There should never be a snap count, as it just gives the rush
something to key on. Instead, there is a simple progression to ensure the ball isn't
snapped until all are ready. First, the holder should count the squad and make
sure there are eleven guys on the field, and then make sure everyone is where
they should be. Then he places himself at the spot where the kicker wants the ball
placed. He lets the kicker get positioned, and then verbally asks him if he's ready.
Once the kicker gives his assent, the holder first raises his arm closest to the LOS,
while keeping the fingers of the other hand right on the spot where the ball is to
be placed. When he is ready for the snap, he raises the other hand. Once the
holder has both hands up, the center snaps the ball as soon as he is ready, and no
earlier. Two things that often get screwed up are that some teams will snap the
ball when the holder's down hand is still down. Stupid, stupid, stupid. How can
you expect him to grab a wild snap if he's not perfectly ready to catch the ball?
The second thing is that centers will want to snap the ball as soon as that hand
comes up. Again - stupid, stupid,stupid. I used to love seeing teams that would do
this on film because I knew I had a chance to block a kick in the next game. As a
rusher, all I had to watch was the holder's down hand and know that I could go as
soon as he lifted it. Looked like Dwight Freeney coming off the edge, man.

The reason that progression is important to follow is that it ensures the ball isn't
snapped until all are ready, and it doesn't allow the defense to anticipate the
snap.

After the snap

C: You have one responsibility a crisp snap. Nothing else. The rest of the line will
do the blocking, you just need to snap the ball and then take up space.

G's, T's, and TE's: At the snap, they all quickly pick up their inside leg (which is
no more than 4" outside the outside leg of the man inside them) and quickly plant
it over and in front of the outside leg of the man inside of them. At the same time,
they should punch with their hands and try to establish contact with the defense
as far from the kick as possible without moving forward. They have three rules to
follow. 1) No man slips between you and the man inside of you. Your efforts are to
the inside. 2) Do not give ground under any circumstances. 3) Any defender who
tries to jump to block the kick should be short of breath when he comes back
down - meaning, you punch them in the stomach. It sounds dirty, but it's
something everybody teaches. Make that guy think twice about exposing his ribs.
W: At the snap he takes a quick jab step with his inside leg to seal off the gap
between him and the TE. The outside leg should not move under any
circumstances. He has the same rules as the line, but it is crucial that no one can
slip between him and the TE. He should make himself as wide as possible (we
liked to have long-armed players here) and make sure to get a hand and shove on
any player that tries to go outside of him. If he positions himself properly, doesn't
move that outside foot, and can get a hand on him, it should take the outside
rusher too long to get to the kick to block it.

H: Simple - get the ball down. Worry less about the laces than getting the ball
right where the kicker wants it and positioned how he wants it. When placing the
ball, you should always use the LOS side hand to hold the top of the ball, and the
kicker side hand to position it. That way, if you don't pull the
positioning/spinhand out of the way in time, the kicker can still kick the ball (and
your hand) and hopefully make it. Do it the other way around and you block the
kicker's kick before it leaves his foot. Don't be that guy. Also it should go without
saying, but don't be the guy that flinches and pulls his hand at the last minute. I
used to hold the point with the first knuckle of my index and second finger, and
stare right through them at a point on the ground until the kick was well away.
That way I was always sure of my hold.

K: Kickers do what kickers do. Just don't pull a Grammatica.

That's the basics of getting a kick off, so let's look at some variations in the
formation:

The most commonly-seen variation of the normal formation is the unbalanced

double wing. Sounds tricky, but it's not:
The thought behind this formation is that by staggering the wings on the one side
(the side of the kicking leg) you create enough depth that it would be impossible
to go around the edge and block the kick. Conversely, on the other side, it makes
the distance that the edge rusher has to go farther, thus making the protection
stronger on both sides. Theoretically, that is. I've never been a big fan of this one,
as in my eyes it's susceptible to pressure at the wings. It gives the defense space to
build up a head of steam and possibly drive the wing back into the kick, or drive
him up field letting a man slip inside. It does, however give you a little more
creative license when it comes to fakes.

The other alternative formation I'll discuss is the classic swinging gate. Yeah,
yeah, people hear swinging gate and they start thinking of short gold shorts and
Indiana basketball. Well this is one version of the football edition:

Looks crazy, right? I agree, but here's why teams will do it. First off, if a team
hasn't prepared for it, you can surprise them into a time-out or an easy two-point
conversion. Just looking at this, the eligible receivers are all over the place (the
outside TE, both W's, the C, H, and K are all eligible receivers).Secondly, if the
kicker is an athlete, they spread the defense out like this they can snap the ball
right too him and he can follow the C and H into the end zone. Thirdly, if the
defense is significantly out-numbered on the left, the center can throw the ball
sideways to the W who has six blockers in front of him. I've seen teams run the
option with the holder and the kicker. 'Ive even seen the center throw the ball left
to the W, who in turn dumps a little pass to a wide open TE. The whole idea is
surprise and outnumbering the defense. What usually happens though, is that the
defense is ready, and before the play clock expires, everybody trots back to a
normal position and the ball is snapped. So again, why do it? Well when a defense
is running around deciding who has whom, they can't really set up a block, can
they? It's a gimmicky play, but one that works.

Now, let's look back at the original formation and talk about fakes, and what to
do when everything goes wrong.

Fakes:

This is the simplest, and can be effective if you have a good, strong runner in the
Wing, and a TE who can seal the edge. At the snap the wing runs behind the LOS
and once receiving the ball, looks for a seam to dive into. The holder catches the
snap and then flips the ball to the Wing. The right Wing has to try and force his
man up field, or failing that, help the TE seal the edge. My alma mater used this
behind the line flip to beat our rivals in OT two years ago.
OK, this looks complex, but it's not really. The left Wing takes a similar route that
he took on the previous one, but his time, rather than flip the ball to him, the H
runs an option to the left with the kicker. If nobody picks him up, he sprints for
the pylon, if he gets pressure, he immediately flips the ball to the kicker who can
either run it or dump the ball over the top to the TE.

In this one, the holder does a little bit of the Charlie Brown and pulls the ball
before the kick. It's imperative that he does an actual roll-out so he gets enough
depth to get around the corner. By that I mean that when he picks up the ball, he
turns his back to the LOS by turning his head to his left shoulder and reversing
around. He has to get out of there quick, as no one on the outside is being
blocked, but they will be working inside to get to the expected kick. The kicker
also has to sell the kick to make the play work. The Wing on the left is the only
player who has a specific spot that he sits, and that is right under the left corner
of the upright. He's the safety valve if everyone is covered, and the holder is
taught to turn and throw the ball at a target just below that corner of the goal
post. In the case of a bad or fumbled snap on any kicking occasion, the holder will
shout "Fire!" as loud as he can, and everyone who hears will execute this same
play. It doesn't always work, but through practice, your Wings and TE's should be
able to hear the call and get out into their routes. (Note of trivia - my little brother
(a WR) threw a TD off a botched snap in a high school game eighteen hours
before I did the same thing in a college game. Bizzare.)

Now you probably know more than you ever thought you would about one of the
simplest plays in football. But like I said, points are the name of the game, so
these plays should be taken very seriously. They are easy to execute, as long as the
unit works together, but as always, it takes eleven to get the job done.

- Bob Pentland